To hell and back: Malone’s Markus McFolling inspires with story of addiction, recovery

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Joe Scalzo @jscalzoREP

Apr 5, 2020 at 5:47 AM

By telling his own story, Markus McFolling wants to give kids hope.

On the night his counterfeit life finally crumbled, Markus McFolling sat for six hours in a holding cell at the Stark County jail, talking to a meth-addled man about drug addiction and telling him, “We’re gonna change our lives one day.”

It was Jan. 16, 2017 — two days before Father’s Day — and McFolling’s wife, Chelsea, had just called the cops on him. He had spent the last few years addicted to opioids, he had a warrant for his arrest on charges of deception to obtain a dangerous drug, a fifth-degree felony and, while he was gone, Chelsea packed up her possessions and left, taking their 7-month-old daughter with her.

But McFolling didn’t know that. And he wasn’t thinking about changing, not really.

He was still thinking about his next fix.

“Here’s how powerful addiction is,” said McFolling, a former all-conference running back for Malone University. “My wife called the cops on me, I had hurt so many people near to us, my life was imploding, I lost everything and the only thing I could think about was the 12 pills I had at our house.

“I had to get back there. But when I came home everything was gone.”

This is the story about how he got everything back.

Breaking out

McFolling grew up in Seaside, Calif., a small(ish) town two hours south of San Francisco on the Pacific coast. His birth father left before he was born, so he was raised by his mother and his stepfather.

After failing to graduate high school, he bounced around a few junior colleges before arriving at Malone University in the fall of 2009 as a big (6-foot-1) running back with an even bigger personality.

“It felt like he always had a smile on his face,” said former Pioneers head coach Eric Hehman, who was hired in 2010. “He was joyful and he was always about others.”

“Markus has always been very infectious,” added his former teammate, linebacker Garret Price. “He was always chatting it up with somebody, always looking to make a joke. And he had a very loud voice. Anywhere he was, you heard him.”

And if you were a linebacker, you felt him. At 245 pounds, McFolling had the frame of a fire hydrant with the feet of a ballerina. He ran for 1,680 yards and 16 TDs in just 17 career games, earning second team all-conference honors as a senior in 2010. He will forever be the last Malone running back to rush for more than 1,000 yards in a season.

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“He was a very physical running back,” Price said. “Oftentimes in practice, we had to go toe-to-toe. More times than I’d like to admit, I was on the receiving end of that punishment.”

Said Hehman, “He did not look like an NAIA player.”

The pro scouts agreed, inviting McFolling to a regional combine in the spring of 2011, where he competed alongside other small college prospects for the chance of getting drafted or landing a free agent contract. But the NFL draft came and went without an offer, so McFolling signed with the Arena Football League’s Orlando Predators.

After two seasons, he went to the San Antonio Talons, where he was poised to be the starting fullback. But, just before the first game of the 2014 season, McFolling dislocated his shoulder and tore his rotator cuff and labrum during a punch-blocking drill in practice.

“I was as healthy as I could be,” he said. “I was working out like crazy, I was in the best shape of my life and I was getting every rep, every play. We had NFL scouts at our practice, so I wasn’t going to step out.

“I remember dislocating my shoulder, going to the sideline and popping in so I could go back to practice. I woke up the next day and couldn’t move my arm.”

Now, understand this. At that point, McFolling had never done drugs. Didn’t drink. Never even smoked a cigarette. But the Talons’ team doctors prescribed him fentanyl, a powerful opioid that sets off alarm bells in 2020 but didn’t carry the same stigma in 2014. McFolling’s shoulder never recovered — he went from bench-pressing 405 pounds to doing push-ups on his knees — and, worse, his psyche didn’t, either.

So McFolling first relied on the drug to mask his physical pain, then his emotional pain.

“Looking back on it now, I was so ignorant,” he said. “I didn’t realize you could become a drug addict taking prescription drugs. I grew up around gang violence, but I was so focused on football, I had tunnel vision.

“But the fentanyl, it took away the pain. It made everything numb. Then I got so depressed as the season wore on, watching my friends get NFL contracts while I was on injured reserve, I started using it to deal with that. My identity was football. It was easy to become psychologically addicted.”

Bottoming out

McFolling met his wife, Chelsea, in Malone’s cafeteria on Oct. 4, 2011 and came away thinking, “You don’t know this, but I’m going to marry you someday.” They were both dating other people at the time, but once those relationships ended, they became close friends, then started dating. After dating for 3 � years, they got married.

“When I met Markus, we were both strong believers,” Chelsea said. “We were living out our faith together with the same values. But after the shoulder injury, he made a complete 180. The drugs really took over and changed his mind. He acted like a completely different person. It was all about whatever it took to get drugs at that time.”

Chelsea tried to strike a tricky balance between supporting her husband without enabling his addiction. But things only grew worse, to the point where his closest friends realized there was a problem.

“It was hard at first because I couldn’t quite figure out what was different,” Price said. “He was still very personable, but … the best way I can put it is he just didn’t seem as genuine as he used to. There was something about him that was a little different. Something that seemed off or a little hidden.

“The long and short of it is, some things started not adding up. There were telltale signs. Me and three other guys close to him more or less had to have an intervention. A lot of different conversations had to take place.”

Price said he was part of a group that more or less forced McFolling to go to rehab, a decision he quickly embraced in hopes of healing himself, as well as his relationship with his wife and daughter. He entered a 13-month program at Ohio Valley Adult and Teen Challenge, a faith-based drug and alcohol rehab center in Youngstown. He barely slept the first week, taking 20 showers a day. He was allowed to talk to his wife and daughter for 15 minutes a week.

“Wooh, talk about isolation,” he said. “I’ve never been so lonely or scared. I had no concept of the future. I was living moment to moment. Prior to rehab, I had been so suicidal. I lost everything and I was like, ‘Time to take my life.’ But I held onto hope that I could actually change. I believed in myself.”

Over the next year, that belief paid off. A pastor from Warren named Everett Whiteside helped walk him through rehab, from addiction to recovery. McFolling rededicated his life to Christ, leaving the facility as a changed man. Through it all, he kept a note on his wall from his Averie, his young daughter.

“They were just scribbles,” he said, “but they helped me through some of my hardest days.

“That place is the perfect greenhouse. You get rid of all your distractions. You focus on yourself and the word of God. I was changing from the inside out, but I needed that protection. I needed to learn that I was good enough just as I am.”

McFolling’s commitment impressed Chelsea, but it also made that year difficult. She worked as a full-time nurse while raising Averie by herself. But it took that full year for her to believe that McFolling was truly different. Even his first few weeks home were tough.

“Part of me was waiting on the edge of my seat, wondering if he was going to act the same way,” she said. “But he was a completely changed person. He was ready to change the world.”

Said McFolling, “I’m not in recovery. I’m recovered.”

Reaching out

After leaving rehab, Markus and Chelsea founded Reach1, a nonprofit that stands for “Reconciling Every Abandoned Child Home.” Through it, he shares his story at schools, churches and community events in hopes of reaching “the kids nobody wants, the kids who are hurt and broken.” He spoke to more than 120,000 kids last year and was in the middle of a busy 2020 when the coronavirus pandemic hit.

“What I love about Markus is he’s not afraid to share his failures,” Whiteside said. “A lot of times, people want to hide their demons in their closet. His closet is wide open. He’s owned up to his failures and he’s committed to helping young men and women like him. The ones who say, ‘You know what? I messed up. I need a hand.’”

Chelsea shares her story, too. In addition to talking about her struggles with Markus, she talks about the two difficult pregnancies that resulted in “miracle babies.” (In addition to 3-year-old Averie, they also have an 8-month old, Dakota.)

“I have a really big heart for women who have been through domestic violence and abuse,” she said. “Our long-term goal is to have a facility where we can have programs for them, maybe even a shelter for women that could be a safe place.”

In the meantime, the McFollings are spending the quarantine doing their best to connect with people digitally, discipling them through social media and Zoom calls.

Earlier this week, they dropped off coffee at several porches with notes saying “We miss you.”

“We’re going crazy, but we’re doing what we can do,” Chelsea said, laughing. “We’ve made a lot of friends and we want them to know we’re still here and we love them.”

One more story. When McFolling was 17, his teammate’s father, Dan Kilough, looked at him and said, “Markus, you’re going to make something of yourself one day.” McFolling never forgot that moment, recalling it right before he left for rehab.

“The same thing Kilough did with me, I want to do with kids all over the country,” he said. “Once I connected the 18 inches between my heart and my brain, that was when my life was born. It didn’t matter how many touchdowns I scored or what jersey I wore. I realized I was good enough right where I was at.

“I want to give kids that same hope.”